Man in the Dark - BookWyrm@ThePit

Sin portada — Paul Auster: Man in the Dark (2009, TBS/GBS/Transworld)

330 páginas

Idioma English

Publicado el 1 de junio de 2009 por TBS/GBS/Transworld.

ISBN:: 978-0-571-24411-9

(1 reseña)

August Brill ha sufrido un accidente de coche y se está recuperando en casa de su hija, en Vermont. No puede dormir, e inventa historias en la oscuridad. En una de ellas, es Owen Brick, un joven mago que despierta en el fondo de un foso. No sabe dónde está pero oye el ruido de una batalla. Entonces aparece el sargento Serge, que le ayuda a salir, y Brick descubre que América está inmersa en una oscura guerra civil. Los atentados del once de septiembre no han tenido lugar, y tampoco la guerra de Irak. Los Estados Unidos combaten desde hace tiempo, pero contra ellos mismos. Unos cuantos estados han declarado la independencia. Brick se entera de que su misión es asesinar a un tal Blake, o Block, o Black, un hombre que no puede dormir, y que inventa en la noche esa guerra que no acabará nunca si él …

August Brill ha sufrido un accidente de coche y se está recuperando en casa de su hija, en Vermont. No puede dormir, e inventa historias en la oscuridad. En una de ellas, es Owen Brick, un joven mago que despierta en el fondo de un foso. No sabe dónde está pero oye el ruido de una batalla. Entonces aparece el sargento Serge, que le ayuda a salir, y Brick descubre que América está inmersa en una oscura guerra civil. Los atentados del once de septiembre no han tenido lugar, y tampoco la guerra de Irak. Los Estados Unidos combaten desde hace tiempo, pero contra ellos mismos. Unos cuantos estados han declarado la independencia. Brick se entera de que su misión es asesinar a un tal Blake, o Block, o Black, un hombre que no puede dormir, y que inventa en la noche esa guerra que no acabará nunca si él no muere. Aunque no se llama Blake ni Block ni Black, sino August Brill, y puede contarnos una feroz y veraz fábula de nuestros días. «Prepárense a robarle tiempo al sueño para devorársela en una sola noche. Así es Auster, queridos» (Manuel Rodríguez Rivero); «Una espléndida historia de fantasías posibles, mundos paralelos y juegos con la Historia» (Javier Aparicio Maydeu, El País).

15 ediciones

Runciter reseñó Man in the Dark de Paul Auster

Stories in Solitude

4 estrellas

Having recently spent several weeks in a (relatively) incapacitated state, I can recognize a bit of myself in August Brill, the protagonist and narrator or Paul Auster's Man in the Dark. In that state, your late-night thoughts can zip off in unexpected trajectories, and you might populate your closed room with "company" of your own invention. Stories are what you got. Convalescing at his adult daughter's home, 72-year-old literary critic Brill is suffering with a leg shattered in an automobile accident, and spends his days and (sleepless) nights in bed, either staring upwards at the ceiling, or binge-watching an endless series of arthouse films with his film student granddaughter. He's prey to sadness, self-mockery, concern for his rudderless family, and ironic nostalgia for the 1950s (his decade of youth, first love, marriage and wide-open personal vistas).

Brill's self-dealt narratives touch upon an alternate-history United States, where the September 11th attacks …

Having recently spent several weeks in a (relatively) incapacitated state, I can recognize a bit of myself in August Brill, the protagonist and narrator or Paul Auster's Man in the Dark. In that state, your late-night thoughts can zip off in unexpected trajectories, and you might populate your closed room with "company" of your own invention. Stories are what you got. Convalescing at his adult daughter's home, 72-year-old literary critic Brill is suffering with a leg shattered in an automobile accident, and spends his days and (sleepless) nights in bed, either staring upwards at the ceiling, or binge-watching an endless series of arthouse films with his film student granddaughter. He's prey to sadness, self-mockery, concern for his rudderless family, and ironic nostalgia for the 1950s (his decade of youth, first love, marriage and wide-open personal vistas).

Brill's self-dealt narratives touch upon an alternate-history United States, where the September 11th attacks never occurred but the country fell into a (hot) civil war spurred on by unrest following the 2000 presidential election. The dimension-hopping protagonist of his scenario, Owen Brick, is given an ultimatum by the ruling powers of his world - to assassinate the "dreamer" who brought the civil war into being, and restore balance and peace to their particular universe. But complications abound. In between bouts of self-doubt and personal recrimination, Brill sifts through the receipts of a complicated life: marriage, infidelity, thwarted hopes and the kind of personal realizations that (hopefully) come later in life rather than not at all.

Man in the Dark was a welcome relief (read immediately upon the heels of a particular mass-market potboiler), thoughtful and thought-provoking. Combines a sense of melancholy, well-observed intergenerational family dynamics, and a sense of acceptance of both responsibility and irresponsibility.

Temas

American fiction (fictional works by one author)
Fiction, alternative history
Fiction, political